Atypical Wounds: Causes and Management

Part 1 in a series discussing the etiology, assessment and management of atypical wounds.

 

As devoted clinicians to the field of wound management we take a responsibility to educate ourselves and others about wound etiologies and characteristics, as well as management of barriers to achieve positive outcomes. We spend a great deal of our careers learning about the most common offenders, such as pressure injuries, diabetic foot ulcers, venous stasis ulcers, arterial wounds, amputations, and traumatic wounds, to name a few. However, as our careers unfold we are faced with extra challenges, and atypical wounds are among them.

 

An atypical wound, also known as a wound of unknown etiology, is caused by a disease or condition that doesn’t cause a wound typically. Inflammatory diseases, infections, chronic illnesses, malignancies, or genetic disorders are examples of diseases that may result in the appearance of a wound. Atypical wounds can also arise from rare causes and usually share uncommon characteristics. In this two-part blog series, I discuss a few atypical wounds, to give you a view of this parallel universe … read more